November 30, 1835 was the day that Florida, Missouri had its biggest resident born. Although he would only stay there for four, years this little town would be in the record books forever. His father moved the family to Hannible, Missouri in the autumn of 1839(Miller x ). His experiences in this small town would help him to write some of his greatest novels. Twain's best work was often characterized by broad, irreverent humor, realism, love of democracy, and a strong hatred of shame and oppression. At least one of those characterizations were evident in all of Mark Twain's novels and books, along with his speeches and short stories.

It was Twain's humor and satire that first brought him national fame as a writer. His book The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County and Other Sketches, published in 1867, was his humorous stories of life that existed on the frontier (Twain 126). That year his humor and satire allowed him to be able to travel around the world to speak to people. He wrote of these speeches and his travels in Innocents Abroad. This piece published in 1869, poked fun at all the European Cultures that usually impressed many American Tourists(126). After being marrie

he really was. The Adventures of Tom Sawyer was a story about the classic boy growing up in a small town(Miller 59). This novel of Twain's would become so absorbed in the life of America that memories of whitewashing a fence are like a common occurrence today (59). This novel is unlike any other because of the way it was written. There is no true plot, merely 4 separate stories loosely holding the whole thing together(60). This book is where Twain shows his cynical side in that all four of the stories involve a death, real or supposed(63). Even though some of the things in this book seem like they are far fetched and could never happen to anybody, all of the events happened in Mark Twain's life. If it didn't happen to him it happened to one of his friends(Cantwell 81 ). He got the idea to write Tom Sawyer from Will Bowen, who visited Twain and helped him remember all the things that happened to him and Will as children growing up in Hannible, Missouri (Crolliers 78). When this book was published in 1876 it was what established Twain as he is today, a master of characterization and situation as well as a master at humor and satire. But after all of that it still was not considered his masterpiece.

In 1876 he would publish a book that would show the world just how talented

d in 1870, his humor and satire began to improve. This is when he wrote what is thought to be his best work; pieces

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Approximate Word count = 944
Approximate Pages = 4 (250 words per page double spaced)